The Romanian Dream » hiking

Hiking – Upper Antelope Canyon, AZ

Mircea — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 16:05:43 +0000

Location:

This is maybe the most famous slot canyon in the US. Both this and the Lower Antelope Canyon were carved by the same flow of water (temporary – flows through the canyons only during flash floods).

Date:

02.07.2010

Map:

Pictures:

Hiking – Lower Antelope Canyon, AZ

Mircea — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 01:46:45 +0000

Location:

Lower Antelope Canyon near Page, AZ

A slot canyon is defined as a very narrow canyon. Usually the depth of the canyon is significantly greater than the width. Now if you’re into exploring canyons in general, and slot canyons in particular, you’ve probably heard of Antelope Canyon. Most people automatically think of Antelope when they think of a slot canyon. What most people don’t know it’s that the Antelope Canyon that they’re thinking about is actually the Upper Antelope Canyon. Yes! There are 2 Antelope Canyons (Upper and Lower).

The Upper Canyon is the well known one. You can buy tickets to visit it online and all the cool pictures of the light beams hitting the sand are taken there. The experience of the Upper Canyon is highly commercial and the massive amount of tourist that are “flooding” the canyon may, at some time, take away some of the thrill of visiting it.

The Lower Canyon isn’t that well known but it’s equally beautiful. It’s more of a family run business than a highly marketed tourist attraction. You can see almost all the nice features that make the Upper Antelope Canyon great.

The two significant differences between them are the V shape of the Lower Antelope Canyon compared to the U shape of the Upper one (being also narrower leads to the birth of the cool light beams) and the fact that the Lower Canyon is steeper (you need ladder to get it/out and navigate parts of it) where the Upper one is walkable end to end.

That being said: here are some pictures of the Lower Antelope Canyon (pictures of Upper Canyon coming in a future post). Keep in mind that the actual experience of navigating the canyon is at least 3 times better than licking the pictures with your eyes

Also, did I mention that both canyons are on Navajo Land?

Date:

02.07.2010

Map:

Pictures:

Hiking – Horseshoe Bend, AZ

Mircea — Sun, 18 Jul 2010 14:02:42 +0000

Location:

Horseshoe Bend near Page, AZ

Date:

01.07.2010

Map:

Hiking – Monument Valley, AZ

Mircea — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 16:15:53 +0000

Location:

Monument Valley, AZ

http://www.navajonationparks.org/htm/monumentvalley.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monument_Valley

Have you ever seen a Western Movie? Do you know who the Duke is? Well, this is the place where many famous western movies were shot (the outside scenes if my understanding is correct).

Leaving this apart, Monument Valley is an impressive place to visit. It’s not a National Park because it belongs to the Navajo Nation. This helps to maintain the rugged views and to experience the Valley in a truly authentic nature. For example, the 17 miles long dirt road loop that goes through the valley is one of those things that you wouldn’t easily find in a National Park. Once you’ve driven this road (takes 2+ hours) you’ll never complain about the state of any other road. This also filters the amateur tourists from the hardcore ones

If you’re a “drive by and take pictures” kind of person, the visitor center has that too. Beautiful views of the valley just a couple of meters from the parking lot.

Date:

01.07.2010

Map:

Pictures:

Hiking – Canyonlands NP, UT

Mircea — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 11:44:01 +0000

Location:

Canyonlands National Park, UT

Very close to Arches National Park is where the Green River meets the Colorado River. The canyons carved by these rivers and their tributaries form a beautiful remote land bearing the name Canyonlands. The park has 3 districts: the Island in the Sky, the Needles and the Maze (basically the 3 parts of the Y that the 2 rivers mentioned above form). We visited the first two only. The later is very remote (even for us) and detailed preparation + a 4×4 vehicle would have been needed.

Date:

30.06.2010

Map:

Pictures:

Hiking – Arches NP, UT

Mircea — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 17:06:54 +0000

Location:

Arches National Park, Utah

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arches_National_Park

This is probably the most beautiful National Park that we’ve visited in the US (at least up until this point). It is located in the vicinity of the small town of Moab, UT. Putting time aside to hike to the famous arches is a must if you want a truly amazing experience. The hike to Delicate Arch, a true Utah landmark is a must. Also, if time allows it a hike to Double-O-Arch (longer hike) or a descend into Fiery Furnace (only range led) are both well worth the time.

Date:

28-29.06.2010

Map:

Pictures:

Balanced Rock

Double Arch

Windows Section

Delicate Arch

Landscape Arch

Partition Arch

Navajo Arch

Black Arch

Double O Arch

Tunnel Arch

Pine Tree Arch

Fiery Furnace

Hiking – Grand Staircase – Escalante National Monument, UT

Mircea — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 15:35:04 +0000

Location:

The Grain Staircase – Escalante National Monument is a US National Monument in Southern Utah. The area is managed by the Bureau of Land Management (first time I’ve heard of it) and was promoted to this status in 1996 (very “young”) by US President, at that time, Bill Clinton. If you are really interested in differences between a National Park and a National Monument these lay more in the procedure of establishing one, the body that administers it and the funding it receives. Setting aside the technicalities, the area is simply amazing. Located along Utah Scenic Byway 12 (SR), only driving through it will be a breath taking experience. Actually stopping and exploring it will only make it better and better depending on the invested time.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Staircase-Escalante_National_Monument

Date:

27.06.2010

Map:

Pictures:

Hiking – De Leo Wall – Trail

Mircea — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 04:11:10 +0000

Location:

De Leo Wall

http://www.wta.org/go-hiking/hikes/de-leo-wall

Date:

12.06.2010

Map:

Pictures:

Hiking – Mount St. Helens – The Pictures

Mircea — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 03:23:00 +0000

Location:

Mount St. Helens

http://www.fs.fed.us/gpnf/recreation/mount-st-helens/

Date:

30.05.2010

Map:

Pictures:

Hiking – Mount St. Helens – The Story

Mircea — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 02:16:54 +0000

Somewhere in February, I said something about climbing Mt St. Helens. Since it was the end of May we did it. It turns out that the normal climbing route, the Monitor Ridge Route (which started at Climbers Bivouac) was closed due to snow. So, left with little choice, we had to take the Worm Flows Route (know as the Winter Route). Instead of 4500 feet in 5 miles we ended up doing 5600 feet in 6 miles (for a whooping total of 12 miles).

We woke up at 2:00 AM in the morning of the hike (30th May). It took a while to eat & do the last minute preparations & pack, so around 4:30 we were on our way. At 7:30 AM we were arriving at the Lone Fir Resort to pick up our climbing permits (22$/permit – bought almost 4 months in advance) and to register for the climb – turns out there is a limited number of 100 permits/day, so a bit of planning goes a long way. After registering, eating and sipping a cup of coffee we were on our way to the trail head. The trail starts in the Marble Mountain Snow-Park at an altitude of 2700 feet.

We started on the trail at around 9:00 AM. (took a while to change our gear, check the backpacks, not to mention that the unfortunate GPS unit that we have managed to get us lost – wasting us around 15 minutes until we figured out it had no idea about the road we should take). With everything that we took (water, food, extra clothes, photo cameras) I think the backpacks were around 20 lbs each.

The first portion of the trail (around 1 mile) was pretty easy and with little to no snow. After that the snow started creeping onto the trail with certain areas being completely frozen. At that point we’ve put on the spikes that we bought in anticipation of such conditions. That coupled with the trekking poles gave us enough stability to continue with minimal effort, at least until we reached the timberline.

The landscape after that was surreal. You can see where the lava flowed down the mountain and the effects of the eruptions are clearly visible. As we continued to go further the quantity of snow increased and the speed of the wind also increased. Not to mention the slope increase From the somewhat clear weather at the trail head we started experiencing heavy mist and high speed winds near the summit (visibility near zero up there). Regardless we pushed ahead taking only short brakes needed for snacks and hydration.

The hike up took around 6.5 hours and coming down took around 3 hours. The thing that we really liked was that from a physical point of view we were prepared for this hike (at no point during or after the hike we felt the massive effort associated with this hike as a burden). And we did have a methodical approach to preparing for this hike so this was not a surprise for us. Around 7:00 PM we were back at the Lone Fir confirming in the climb register that we made it back safely from the volcano.We went back home.

As a side note: if you ever consider doing something like this, bring and wear quality sunglasses and bring and use a quality sunscreen lotion. Although we knew about this and we did bring the sunscreen with us we didn’t use it and got some pretty nasty sunburns on our faces. The thing is that we didn’t realize how strong the sun was reflecting from the snow, probably due to the chilling wind that was blowing. Don’t do the same mistake.

Pictures of the hike to follow shortly.